Girls Varsity Swimming·
Feb 24
Can-do in Canton

CANTON, Ohio — The Pirate Girls’ Swimming & Diving squad put a lid on its 2018-19 season by competing in the Ohio Division I Championships on Friday and Saturday. Rocky River logged one individual qualifier and two championship relays in Friday’s preliminaries. On Saturday, River scored 17 team points to claim 30th place in the Buckeye State title meet. [results]

Qualified into six events at C.T. Branin Natatorium off last week’s district meet, Rocky River athletes turned half of those slots into title swims on Saturday.

Junior Peyton Spearry touched in with a time of 57.40 seconds in Friday’s 100-yard backstroke qualifier. On Saturday, Spearry shaved a fifth-of-a-second off that time in claiming 12th place in the championship race.

River’s 200 medley relay – a quartet comprised of Spearry, Katherine Burgess, Anna Skapoulas and Morgan Schuld – earned a Saturday swim and placed 13th with a final time of 1:47.82.

The Pirates’ 400 freestyle relay (Spearry, Mackenzie Schuld, Ella Russell, Skapoulas) posted a program-record time of 3:33.37 to qualify for a lane on Saturday. They placed 15th on Saturday evening.

Thirtieth place marks River’s best finish since 2016.

For Rocky River, Saturday’s state meet capped off another successful season. The program has now earned a top-35 placement in 4-of-6 years since being classified as a DI program prior to the 2013-14 season. On Feb. 2, the Pirates earned their fourth straight Great Lakes Conference championship.

Mason (204 points) edged out Hoover (201) at the top of the girls’ DI standings on Saturday. Fifty-five teams earned team points.